Marketers Know AI Is the Future, But Do They Understand AI Today?

Here’s a quick reality-check for the next artificial intelligence (AI) pitch you hear: Ask what the company’s solution optimizes for. If the answer is along the lines of “anything you need,” that should raise a red flag.

AI doesn’t work that way, but it’s ad tech’s favorite new buzzword, so you can understand why marketers say they’re prioritizing a technology that few understand.

I began working with AI as a teenager, taught in the field at Harvard and MIT, and wrote books on the subject. Breakthroughs in the field since I wrote my first book at age 16, How to Build a Computer-Controlled Robot, have been extraordinary. In many ways, our present is a version of the future described in the science fiction novels I read as a kid.

But innovation never moves at the pace of fiction. And reading today’s breathless headlines about how AI will completely transform marketing and advertising overnight makes me worry that advertisers are being taken for a ride.